![\"Clockwise:](\"https:\/\/magazine.hmc.edu\/summer-2015\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2015\/08\/students-squirrel-body-1.jpg\")
<\/a>Michaela Yaman \u201918 and Kristin Lie \u201918 install and test sheet metal on a tree trunk as a squirrel deterrent. Professor Furuya tried one of\u00a0the suggested squirrel deterrents\u2014Irish Spring soap\u2014on his fig trees and was able to harvest a bountiful crop.\u00a0\u201cThe students\u2019 brilliant idea worked,\u201d he says. The diagram shows\u00a0one team\u2019s wiffle ball\/soap solution.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Frustrated, Furuya enlisted students in the Introduction to Engineering Design and Manufacturing (E4) class to create a non-lethal, non-harmful device to prevent squirrels from eating the fruit from his trees.<\/p>\n
Three teams of up to four first-years devised clever methods to physically protect the ripe fruits from squirrels. They sought to create contraptions that were aesthetically pleasing, low-maintenance, non-lethal and inexpensive. Students tested scents and flashing lights and considered shiny items (mirrors, CDs) and buzzers. After hearing all the presentations, Furuya decided to employ a method proposed by all teams: a scent deterrent. He\u2019s installed lunch bags filled with Irish Spring soap to his fig tree and is monitoring it closely in the hopes that he\u2019ll be able to enjoy more of his fruit this season.<\/p>\n A chemistry and biology joint major, Eun Bin Go \u201915 knew nothing about tetracyclic scaffolds when she joined chemistry Professor David Vosburg\u2019s lab in her sophomore year. But by her senior year, she was an award-winning researcher.<\/p>\n Not only was she recognized by the Department of Chemistry with numerous awards and by the National Science Foundation with a Graduate Research Fellowship honorable mention, she received The Claremont Colleges Library Undergraduate Research Award (senior award in the sciences) for establishing \u201ca remarkably direct and flexible approach to a whole class of beautiful and medicinally relevant compounds.\u201d<\/p>\n Her research on \u201cSynthesis of the Tetracyclic Scaffolds of the Endiandric Acids Through Iterative Cross-Coupling\u201d should provide access to antimalarial, antibacterial, antitubercular and anti-inflammatory natural products found in plants, says Vosburg.<\/p>\n \u201cEun Bin designed and executed a remarkably creative and successful senior thesis project, making two complex, medicinally interesting molecules,\u201d he says. \u201cNeither of these compounds had ever been made before. Facing challenges that my research group has struggled with for nearly 10 years, she generated independent strategies to approach her targets and took complete intellectual ownership of the project. Some of the major chemical methods she employed have appeared in Nature Chemistry in 2014 and most recently in the cover story for Science (March 13, 2015). The goal of this approach is to make building complex molecules as easy as assembling LEGO blocks. Using the general methods developed by Marty Burke\u2019s group at the University of Illinois, Eun Bin successfully applied them to an even more challenging case.\u201d<\/p>\n Of her initial inexperience, Go says, \u201cI slowly learned as I spent time in lab and saw the work that was being done by more experienced students. One thing I appreciate about Harvey Mudd is its support for undergraduate research experience, and it is not difficult for students to develop a strong understanding of their research topics, which they may not initially know much about.\u201d<\/p>\n She pursued research during several academic years and a summer at Harvey Mudd and during a summer at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, learning different approaches to making molecules. Go returns to New York City for the Tri-Institutional PhD program in Chemical Biology, a graduate program offered jointly by Weill Cornell Medical College, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and Rockefeller University that focuses on research at the interface of chemistry and biology. \u201cThere, I hope to apply small organic molecules in studying important biological problems, like mechanisms of pathogenesis\/tumorigenesis and drug resistance,\u201d says Go.<\/p>\n Several Mudd teams competed in the 2015 Mathematical and Interdisciplinary Contests in Modeling (MCM\/ICM) and to great success.<\/p>\n Teammates Matthew Dannenberg \u201916, Justin Lee \u201916 and Micah Pedrick \u201917 earned a rare Finalist designation in the ICM\u2014the second-highest scoring percentile. After crunching 30 equations with 2,500 variables, producing 1,382 lines of MATLAB code and a 20-page technical report, and downing two gallons of Goldfish crackers and eight Twinkies, they created a model to monitor organizational turnover with the intent of aiding managers in employee recruitment. Their findings included: It\u2019s better to fire incompetent employees and search for a new hire than to keep an underperformer; and, it\u2019s better to promote current employees to management positions than to hire an external individual to the position.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a fantastically fun experience, and it was really awesome to program some stuff into the model, run those equations and see other behavior that we had never even thought of,\u201d says Pedrick.<\/p>\n The trio toiled with six other Harvey Mudd teams over 96 consecutive hours. Each team wrote a formal paper on one of the contest problems, which included eradicating Ebola, searching for a lost plane and sustainable engineering. Findings were judged on scientific and mathematical accuracy, clarity of exposition, insight and creativity. \u201cWhat I loved about this year\u2019s contests is that the problems really focused on issues that are currently receiving global attention,\u201d says Susan Martonosi, MCM\/ICM coordinator and associate professor of mathematics. In the MCM, one Harvey Mudd team earned Meritorious honors and the other Honorable Mention (top 42 percent).<\/p>\n In the ICM, two teams received Meritorious honors (top 17 percent).<\/p>\n If you\u2019d wandered onto the property east of The Claremont Colleges on a bright fall morning in 2014, you might have gotten something of a wake-up call: the ear-deafening, 200-Newton thrust of a hybrid rocket motor being tested by Harvey Mudd students.<\/p>\n The Experimental Hybrid Propulsion System is a continuing Shanahan Student-Directed Project that aims to design, build and test a throttleable hybrid rocket motor. Under the advisement of Professor of Physics Gregory Lyzenga \u201975, a student research team sought to improve upon the design of the motor\u2019s oxidizer plumbing system, consulting with several well-known rocket manufacturers in the process. Contributors were Benjamin Chasnov \u201916, Jessica Chen \u201915, Andrew Donelick \u201915, Christopher Hirlinger \u201915, Yeahmoon Hong \u201916 and Jonpaul Littleton \u201915. Think you know the Libra Complex well enough to navigate past flying robots and find your E4 hammer parts? Sound like a game? It is!<\/figure>\nNovel Compounds<\/h2>\n
A Model Performance<\/h2>\n
Building A Hybrid<\/h2>\n
\nA hybrid rocket motor is a rocket propulsion system that burns a solid fuel and a liquid oxidizer to achieve thrust. The goal is to control the thrust of the motor at any point in time, so that it can be programmed to follow variable thrust curves. Team members continued progress from the previous year, upgrading various motor components, evaluating performance through static tests, analyzing different fuel grains\u2019 effect on thrust and implementing a throttling control system.<\/p>\nGamer\u2019s Delight<\/h2>\n
\nMatterport Clinic liaison Mike Beebe \u201901 tasked one Harvey Mudd team with demonstrating applications that showcase the company\u2019s unique ability to create models of interior spaces using its high-end 3-D cameras. The team liked the idea of an application that transports gamers to fun, familiar settings\u2014for example, an immersive video game set on campus.<\/p>\n